


Arrangements

by narsus



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Incest, M/M, Military, Multi, Polyamory, Threesome - M/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-07
Updated: 2011-03-07
Packaged: 2017-10-16 04:30:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/168425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/narsus/pseuds/narsus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John knows that there are many things that aren’t meant to happen in a civilised, democratic, first world country: encouraging incest is the least of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Arrangements

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Sherlock belongs to the BBC, Mark Gatiss & Steven Moffat, and obviously in the genesis of it all, to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

“...hurting yourself so that the person you care for doesn’t suffer.”

John only hears the end of the conversation. The part where Mycroft sounds deceptively milder because he’s driving his point home, while Sherlock bristles with instinctive fury. Predictably Sherlock is hissing insults and tossing out throw away comments about Mycroft’s weight by the time John steps fully into the room but for once John’s first reaction isn’t to side defensively with Sherlock from the outset. Something in Mycroft’s tone, the way he carelessly weathers Sherlock’s insults rather than batting them away in minor irritation at their intrusion on the greater affairs of state, catches John’s attention. He looks at Mycroft first rather than Sherlock and, most likely, something in his gaze betrays him because Mycroft is quick to look away and direct a patronising stare at his brother instead. Sherlock notices John’s attention too and abruptly turns away as well, though for an instant he bites hard at his lower lip, and it takes Mycroft’s goading to make him take up their sparse argument again.

When Mycroft has gone, John sits down heavily in the chair that the elder Holmes had occupied and tries not to let his own imagination run away with him. Unfortunately Sherlock takes his choice of seating as indicative and fixes John with a hard eyed stare. John rubs a hand across his face.

“I was thinking.”  
“Undoubtedly.” Sherlock at least doesn’t sound quite as poisonous as he had done a few minute earlier.  
“About your brother.”  
There’s a momentary look of absolute blankness as Sherlock’s face goes slack in surprise, then everything shifts and his expression becomes closed and bitter.  
John doesn’t have the words to explain and the furious suspicion now focused upon him doesn’t encourage him to try. Instead he sighs, half makes to throw up his hands in defeat before aborting the gesture and pushing himself up out of the chair. “Coffee?”  
“Yes.” Sherlock answers when John turns away, making the affirmation sound like a death threat.

The next day John goes to see Mycroft. Unsurprisingly his early morning text is responded to with an appointment time in reply and is followed not long after by a glare that suggests that Sherlock is only debating _how_ to strangle him rather than whether or not to do so. Escape to Mycroft’s office seems a minor price to pay when Sherlock is pacing the flat and occasionally contorting his hands into claws that, for all his military training, John fears will eventually end up around his neck.

“Is there a problem?” Mycroft’s expression is politely enquiring and entirely false.  
“No. Not a problem exactly.” John watches Mycroft freeze for a second before forcing himself to relax and lean back against his desk.  
“Really? I would have thought he’d be making a fuss, after yesterday that is. He does so love to be dramatic.” Mycroft tilts his head to the side slightly, affecting casual unconcern, but his hands grip the edge of the desk more tightly than is strictly necessary.  
John sighs. “He’s fine.”  
That familiarly synthetic smile paints itself across Mycroft’s face and John wonders if the elder Holmes honestly thinks that it makes him look sympathetic.  
“It’s just... I heard what you said yesterday.”  
Mycroft’s eyebrows raise but his expression is neutral.  
“About hurting and...”  
“Yes?”  
John looks down at the floor, at the chair between them, where he decidedly hasn’t sat down, at his own feet, trying to find the words. Then he looks up, meeting Mycroft’s gaze steadily. “You were talking about yourself.”  
Mycroft’s mouth opens but then he hesitates, eyes narrowing, trying to gauge just how much John knows.  
“You were talking about yourself and Sherlock. And I think there’s more to it: you’re in love with him.” He manages to make it sound matter-of-fact rather than melodramatic.  
Mycroft looks, for an instant, as if he’s going to laugh but then he shuts his mouth firmly and nods, once, decisively.  
John lets out the pent up breath he didn’t realise he was holding.  
“What do you intend to do with this information?”  
John shakes his head. “Nothing. I didn’t come here to blackmail you. It’s just- You could, I bet you could. I mean- Sherlock and you.” The gentle reminder that he’s actively encouraging incest chases itself across his mind with all the significance of dry leaves blowing across the road in autumn.  
This time it’s Mycroft who studies the floor. “We did.” He says softly, arms folded.  
“You...?”  
“Years ago. He was too young and I... was lacking in impulse control.”  
There’s nothing John can say to that.  
“He hates me for it now of course.” Mycroft’s gaze, when it meets John’s, is steady. “He has every right to.”

When John gets home he resolves to be kinder to Sherlock, if only for as long as he can, before he decides that Sherlock is too brilliant and too irritating to respond to with anything less than equal pettiness. Unfortunately, kindness seems to be exactly the wrong track to take. Sherlock physically recoils from the first evidence of gentleness and by the afternoon seems to be actively hiding from John instead.

“What did he tell you?” Sherlock’s voice carries faintly through the gap between his bedroom door and the doorframe. The interior of the room is pitch black.  
John sighs, he’s been doing it a lot recently, and slowly inches the door open with a foot. When there’s a wide enough gap he holds the mug of coffee through it, deciding that if Sherlock takes the mug then it’s as good a place as any to start.  
Oddly, Sherlock’s fingers brush his as he accepts the mug from John’s hand but he doesn’t say anything else.  
“He told me that you have every right to hate him.”  
“Liar.” The door starts to close.  
“He said that it was his fault that you...” John isn’t quite sure how to describe what he’s been told.  
“Weren’t good enough for him?” The door opens fully and Sherlock leans against the doorframe cradling the mug in his hands, expression sour.  
“Is that what you think?”  
“I don’t guess, John.”  
It takes John a moment to consider the fact that he’s never heard his own name pronounced so coldly. He swallows a mouthful of his own coffee and ignores the unsettling sensation of being so summarily dismissed.  
“He-“  
“He loves you.”  
“How... He doesn’t. Stop being such an idiot.” Sherlock pushes himself away from the doorframe and turns his back to John entirely.  
“He probably always has.”  
Sherlock remains with his back to John but turns his head, glancing over his shoulder, watching John’s every movement.  
John shrugs. “You should call him.”  
Sherlock doesn’t respond as John walk away.

Sometime in the course of the following week something changes. John can’t name the precise point but for a few days he honestly wonders if Sherlock is going to have some kind of nervous breakdown, not because of what he does do, but because of what he doesn’t. Experiments on the living room table go untended, newspapers with the lurid details of the latest sensationalist murder go ignored, even Lestrade’s phonecalls go unanswered.

“It’s Lestrade. He says there’s a case.” Having answered what looks like at least the third call from the same number, John holds up Sherlock’s phone illustratively.  
“I can’t.” Sherlock sits at the end of the couch, feet pulled up onto the seat, curled up into himself.  
“Can’t?”  
An impatient wave of one long-fingered hand. “I’m busy.”  
“Doing what?”  
“Can you get off the phone? I’m waiting for a call.” Sherlock bites at the side of his thumb for a minute. “You go. Collect the data.” He doesn’t look at John as he says it.  
Which is how John ends up being picked up by a police car, by Lestrade personally, outside their flat not much later.

“What’s wrong with him?” Lestrade sounds gruff and not a just a little worried.  
“Beats me.” He ignores the suspicious look Lestrade shoots him and deliberately makes small talk for the rest of the journey.

John’s just about resigned himself to honestly trying to gather the data that Sherlock will need by the time they arrive at the crime scene. Then he remembers that he has no idea how to go about it. Lestrade seems to realise it too because instead of heading straight in they stop inside the police cordon, not quite so close to the building, while Lestrade loudly declares the need to brief him first.

“Why are you really here? What’s he doing?” Lestrade lowers his voice.  
“He’s waiting for a call.” John finds himself whispering back.  
“To do with this?”  
John shrugs. It isn’t likely but he won’t say it.  
Lestrade pulls out a pack of cigarettes.  
“I thought you quit.”  
“Can’t. Not when I’m running around after Sherlock bloody Holmes.” Lestrade says around the cigarette that’s already in his mouth.

They turn and watch the building, while Lestrade smokes slowly, as if something new and interesting might actually happen. It does but it’s behind them. The sound of a car pulling up only prompts a glance from John but when he recognises the car his sudden attention attracts Lestrade’s as well.

“What the-“  
The car door opens and the familiar figure of Mycroft Holmes steps out. He doesn’t acknowledge his audience and instead holds a hand out formally to help someone else out of the car. Sherlock permits the chivalrous gesture, taking Mycroft’s hand and allowing himself to be assisted. Their hands don’t touch for long but there’s no hurry on either of their parts in letting go. They exchange a few words, heads bent together slightly and then Sherlock is striding towards the crime scene without a backwards glance. Mycroft doesn’t linger, smoothly getting back into the car without ever having acknowledged anything other than Sherlock.

John’s watching the car pull away when Lestrade’s voice intrudes.  
“He gives me the creeps.” A quick whisper.  
“Who?”  
“Sherlock’s boyfriend.”  
And then Sherlock himself is there to forestall any further conversation.

It’s the body language John decides in the taxi home afterwards, something in the way they communicate that tells it all. Lestrade may not be as good at reading it as Sherlock but he’s been a police officer long enough to know what to look for. In Lestrade’s case it might even be subconscious, an instinctive read that tells him who is and isn’t dangerous, so fast that even he doesn’t realise what he’s doing. Or maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s just the same as John’s own military training when it comes to recognising hostiles, training that’s become so ingrained that it’s become an automated response. Glancing sideways at Sherlock, it strikes him that if the world’s only consulting detective had a mind to it, he’d be a terrifying interrogator. If he ever did... well, John acknowledges that he’d be quite willing to look up some old contacts, if Sherlock needed any help getting started. It’s a fine art after all and there’s always the need for medical professionals to hand, to make sure that any collateral damage is or isn’t permanent as required.

“From what is to their harm and injustice I will keep them.” John murmurs.  
“What?” Sherlock eyes John suspiciously.  
“Hippocratic Oath. You do know who Hippocrates is, right?”  
Sherlock’s eyes narrow. “If you’re-“  
“No! No, I wasn’t- something else. Work I use to do.” John smiles cheerily for good measure, realising the conclusion that Sherlock’s come to.  
“Work you use to do.” Sherlock’s tone is still suspicious.  
“Army stuff.” John rolls his shoulders and turns the movement into a half-shrug.  
Sherlock continues to stare at John for a moment before turning away to look out of the taxi windows instead.  
“It’s just that harm and injustice sometimes cancel each other out.” John adds, feeling suddenly like he’s deliberately withholding evidence.  
“I’ll bet they do.” Sherlock doesn’t look back at him but his lips twitch upwards into a brief, sardonic smile.

Later, once Sherlock has gone out again, presumably to meet Mycroft, it occurs to John that perhaps he hadn’t been quite as clear as he’d thought he was being. He’d been trying to make a confession of sorts for some reason. Mostly because he instinctively wants to tell Sherlock the truth in a way that he’d never wanted to tell Harry, even when they had been close. He’d let Harry tease him, trying to cajole the truth out of him but he’d never let on. He didn’t want Harry to know or rather he didn’t think she had the right to. Sherlock, on the other hand, somehow warrants an unvarnished explanation before he uncovers it himself and, possibly, takes offence at John’s reticence.

“You know earlier, what I said...” John begins the minute Sherlock steps through the door, cheeks flushed presumably from the cold.  
“I know.”  
“Good. So, about that- What do you mean you know?”  
“Mycroft has your service record.”  
“You’ve... you’ve seen it?” John can hear the pitch of his voice rise.  
“No.” Sherlock draws the word out slowly as if John is deliberately being simple.  
“You... oh. Mycroft.”  
“He keeps wanting to offer you a job.” Sherlock unwinds his scarf, turning his back to John to hook it up.  
“What... type of job?”  
Sherlock slips off his coat. “Attending physician. Casual work. Nothing strenuous.”  
John finds that he’s actually considering it.  
“Keeps trying to offer me a job too.” Some of that familiar annoyance creeps back into Sherlock’s voice.  
“Oh?”  
“Calls it data-“  
“Retrieval.” John finishes for him.  
Sherlock fixes John with a penetrating stare. “Is that what you did?”  
“Me? No, not my- I was just-“  
“Attending physician.”  
John smiles deliberately, innocently. “Coffee?”

A month passes in the usual fashion and John realises that to anyone else but him it looks like everything is just the same as before. He works at the hospital, receives demands via text from Sherlock and occasionally rushes off behind him to the next crime scene. There are a few changes of course but only minor ones. Lestrade refuses to come up to the flat unless he’s already verified, via John, that ‘Sherlock’s boyfriend’ isn’t there. Mrs Hudson makes the usual mother hen noises about him and Sherlock. Mycroft’s car pulls up at the curb unannounced and ominous, infrequently. Sherlock spends more evenings out without John for company and John twice answers the call of duty for Queen and country as attending physician.

It’s the morning after one of John’s highly paid and extremely classified few hours of patriotic work when he wakes up on the couch, still wearing last night’s clothes, to the sound of Sherlock dragging a weekend suitcase inexpertly across the carpet.

“Romantic getaway?” He teases sleepily.  
“Brussels. Conference.”  
“Still. Can’t be bad.”  
Sherlock frowns, looking round the room as if trying to make sure he hasn’t forgotten anything. “Better not be. I refused to go to Helsinki and he’s going to The Hague next week.” He spits the last bit out.  
“Something wrong with the Netherlands?”  
Sherlock gives him a pitying look. “International Court of Justice. _Not_ my thing.”  
“Not Mycroft’s either I suppose.”  
Sherlock smiles at that, a genuinely pleasant expression, and then much to John’s surprise crosses the room swiftly to bend down and press a quick kiss to John’s cheek.  
“Sherlock!”  
But Sherlock is hurrying from the room, suitcase behind him. “Car’s here. See you Sunday!” He waves a hand over his head and vanishes down the stairs.

John sighs. There’s no telling what possessed Sherlock to kiss him, albeit on the cheek. It could be any number of things and most likely was the product of sheer exuberance but John focuses on it anyway. Mycroft Holmes is a very lucky man he decides. A very dangerous man too but lucky all the same.

The footsteps pounding up the stairs alert John to Sherlock’s abrupt return. “Your parents were divorced.” He says as if John wouldn’t have realised it without prompting.  
“Yes.”  
Sherlock looks like he’s going to stay something else but then doesn’t.  
“And yes, that’s probably why I’m doing this.”  
“Liar.”  
“What?”  
“Sunday.” Says Sherlock and makes it sound like a threat with an added pointing finger for emphasis, before turning and hurrying off again.  
“Sunday.” John repeats rubbing at the back of his neck as he stands up. Presumably it will be a day of reckoning.

John spends most of Saturday in bed, catching up on lost sleep and luxuriating in the fact that he has nowhere to be and no Sherlock on hand to make demands of him. He gets up in the afternoon and cooks himself a full English breakfast which he spends the next few hours digesting. There’s nothing much on the TV but it works as reasonable background noise while he reads his e-mail and clicks idly across a variety of links. He keeps up with a few medical journals, glances over the BBC website headlines and when he finally runs out of links to follow, attempts a Googlewhack or two. In the end he goes to bed early, anticipating that the usual chaos will once more reign when Sherlock returns.

Sunday morning he wakes up early, surprised at the silence in the flat when he comes downstairs to the living room. Breakfast and lunch pass without Sherlock’s arrival and John starts to wonder if Sherlock meant a week on Sunday and not just the next day. Around mid-afternoon he takes to playing with his phone and scrolling past Harry’s number accidentally hits the call button. On a whim he lets it ring, not expecting Harry to actually pick up, and it’s that same odd sensation that leads him to invite her round when she does.

When she arrives it’s awkward. He’s suddenly embarrassed about the state of the flat, the state of his clothes, the way he stumbles over what should be conversation. It’s difficult, even if he ought to be able to claim some kind of moral higher ground, because he doesn’t actually want to, because grievances aside she’s still the sister that he always admired. The girl who... got the girl, saved the day and was just plain cooler than everybody else. Even now, half rung out from what looks like another go at detox she’s still smart, funny, stylish, if a little too thin. If he was a girl he’d probably fancy her too.

“Drink?” He asks as she drops into a chair and immediately curses himself for his phrasing.  
She catches his chagrin immediately and flashes him a wide grin. “Dying for a cuppa.”

Of course she makes the save. She’s Harry Watson, all round decent chap, saving the world, one pretty girl at a time. He tries not to think about the fact that she evidently can’t manage to save herself.

“So, girlfriend?” She asks once she’s settled comfortably with a cup of tea.  
“No.”  
She looks around, taking the decor and jumble in. “Boyfriend?”  
“He’s not-“  
She laughs but there’s no malice in it. “Friend with perks?”  
He shakes his head, laughing a little himself at her directness. “No. No, he’s already got someone.”  
“Some _one_.” Her deliberately raised eyebrows are indication enough that she’s caught on to the lack of gender indication.  
“A boyfriend. He’s got a boyfriend.” He concedes.  
She sips her tea and grins.  
“Harry.”  
“What?” She’s all fake innocence.  
“He-“  
“Lives with you.”  
“I’m not gay.”  
“Bi.” She shrugs.  
“It’s long-term. They’ve been together for years.”  
Another shrug. “Can’t be that serious if his boyfriend lets him live with you.”  
“Let’s...?”  
“You’re interested, he’s probably interested and you live together. I wouldn’t let my boyfriend live with someone like that, if I was a guy.”  
“He chose the place by the way. I just moved in.”  
She nods as if that explains everything.  
John sips his tea and waits for an explanation.  
“Terminal rows. Some people are just wired like that.”  
He doesn’t point out that she could just as easily be describing herself and Clara.

The conversation drifts back into safer waters. Harry asks about his job, he asks about hers. She talks about the car she’s considering selling and how she’s not sure if she wants to give up the convenience of just getting in the car and being able to drive to work.

“Buy a season ticket?”  
“And get up early every morning just to make it to Paddington?”  
“You can sleep on the train.”  
She snorts.  
This time he grins back. Harry’s never been one for sharing her space voluntarily. The thought makes him wonder if that was her problem all along.  
“I can’t just get on the tube and commute- how many stops is it?”  
“Five to Bart’s but I work at St Thomas’.”  
“And how many stops is that?” She asks slyly.  
“Three.” He concedes. “You live in Ruislip.” He adds in his defence.  
“You live in Zone One.”  
“I don’t _own_ this place.”  
She shrugs.  
“I’m not the one with the house, no mortgage and a sports car.”  
“I’ll buy you a Segway.”  
He can’t keep a straight face at that and sinks back in his seat laughing.

Superficially she’s the successful one. She’d done well for herself early on, climbing the corporate ladder while he was still being run ragged by a junior doctor’s hours. She’d settled easily into her success while he’d fought for progress and direction. When he’d joined the army she’d been disappointed, he supposes. She’d told him that he was so much better than that, he’d ignored it and resolved never to tell her that he’d signed up because, unlike her, he couldn’t just make opportunities happen. He’d done well in that sort of structured environment anyway, better than even he’d hoped for and when he’d come home walking, talking and acting like somebody else maybe she’d even believed, for a moment, that it had been best for him too. Of course when he’d come back from this tour of duty, honourably discharged and compensated by a scant army pension she’d taken issue with the armed forces again. But by then she’d had problems of her own to think about.

They talk about other things after that, family, friends, growing up in the commuter belt. She doesn’t mention Clara at all, somehow managing to avoid the topic entirely, even in amongst socialising anecdotes. It’s almost instinctive when he finds himself talking about Sherlock just a little too much to fill up that gap. It’s just as instinctive when she notices but doesn’t comment, knowing that he won’t appreciate her observations on the matter.

By the time she glances at her watch and complains about an early start on Monday it’s fairly late and John tries to find a local taxi company number futilely, on instinct, before she cracks the obvious joke that it’s not that late, the tube is still running and she’ll make it across the city faster by train anyway. Still, they linger in the doorway downstairs when she should be on her way. There isn’t much to say but they’re not doing much other than chatting idly anyway, just stretching out the time, enjoying their re-found equanimity. John’s just starting to shiver in the cold air and Harry is finally inching away from the door when the car pulls up. Her eyebrows shoot skywards when Mycroft steps out of the car followed by Sherlock.

“John-“ Mycroft begins politely looking like he might come introduce himself to Harry as well.  
“Get back in the car, you’ll catch a cold.”  
Mycroft gives Sherlock a level stare and John wonders if they’re going to start sniping at each other again, but then Mycroft nods to John and Harry and gets back into the car. He leaves the door open.  
Sherlock ignores them both and busies himself with retrieving his luggage from the boot. Once he’s got it set down on its wheels he drags the little case roughly up onto the curb and past Mycroft without looking back.  
“I’ll see you on Thursday.” Mycroft calls after him.  
“No.”  
“Next Tuesday then.”  
Sherlock actually turns to face Mycroft. “You’re going to Luxembourg.” He says as if that explains his distaste.  
“The ECJ isn’t the _only_ thing there and I won’t be long anyway. We can-“  
“Can’t. John’s taking me to the ballet.”  
Which is news to John.  
“We planned it weeks in advance.”  
“Did you.” Mycroft’s gaze is fixed entirely on John now and it definitely bodes ill.  
“We can cancel! Really, I don’t mind. You know, it was just something to do. Nothing important-“  
“Really John.” Sherlock’s moved across the pavement now and slipped his arm through John’s. “It’s something of an anniversary.”  
John lifts his head to stare at Sherlock, about to say something that will at least save him from whatever diabolical demise Mycroft looks like he’s planning, when Sherlock takes the opportunity to bend down and kiss him hard on the mouth.

The kiss is closed mouthed and brief but even as Sherlock pulls back, John’s military training is telling him that there’s a rather extreme threat over to his right that, at any moment, might be likely to turn him into yet another army statistic. At which point Harry coughs, loudly and unnecessarily. Sherlock uses the distraction to flee up the stairs and John finds himself steadying Harry’s suddenly wobbly form. Except she isn’t really unsteady and her body is now blocking any direct assault that Mycroft might think of making. When there’s no response from Mycroft, she coughs a little bit more, leaning her head on John’s shoulder so that it looks like there’s a genuine problem that he’s going to have to deal with. Mycroft closes the door and the car pulls away.

“Harry?”  
She straightens up, shoving her hands deep into her jacket pockets.  
“Thanks.”  
That charming, cheeky grin returns to her face, then suddenly it fades. “They’re siblings.”  
“Yeah, about that- How did you...?”  
She raises her eyebrows at him.  
“I mean- I don’t mind-“  
“You don’t mind?” She’s incredulous. “ _We’re_ siblings!”  
“You’re not my type.”  
For a minute her face is entirely blank then she doubles over laughing.

He isn’t surprised that she doesn’t fish for details before she heads for the tube, hunched against the night air. Harry is too perceptive to make demands like that, and she’s probably well aware that he wouldn’t, as yet, have any answers. As he mounts the stairs it occurs to him that part of the reason he isn’t hugely bothered by Sherlock being able to read him must be because when it comes to figuring him out, Harry’s just as good. He’d needed military training to make himself even slightly unreadable to her and even then, all that had done was change the obvious specifics of whatever he was hiding to more generalised ones.

“You’re going to ask questions.” Sherlock states from where he’s sprawled on the cough, suitcase at his feet, still wearing coat and scarf.  
“No. I was going to make tea.”  
“Tea.”  
“Tea, Sherlock. You know what tea is.” John’s suddenly far too tired for any kind of serious conversation.  
“About that...”  
“Do we have any Horlicks?”  
Sherlock pull a face.  
“You drink watered beef extract.”  
“Saved lives in the Crimea.”  
“That’s just what it says on the Fortnum’s website.”  
Sherlock snorts. “Drinking milk before bed won’t help you sleep anyway. It might help you _stay_ asleep but-“  
John waves Sherlock’s explanation away.  
“Really, it won’t-“  
“Mental association.”  
“What?”  
“It’s the mental association that does it. The smell and taste triggers pleasant associations, associations of relaxation, tiredness, comfort. That sort of thing.”  
“So?” Sherlock sounds vaguely defensive.  
“It’s mental conditioning. I’m surprised you don’t know this already. Seems like it’d be handy in your line of work.”  
Sherlock folds his arms across his chest and sinks down further on the couch.  
“Defensive.” John notes. “Closed in arms but it’s also a self-comforting behaviour. But, your legs are sticking out further, making it harder for anyone to get physically close to you, so you’re angry as well as uncommunicative.”

Oddly enough, John’s examination of Sherlock’s body language seems to diffuse the situation. Sherlock’s expression relaxes and he gets up to remove coat and scarf.

“Did you want tea then?”  
“Horlicks, if we’ve got some.”  
John smiles as Sherlock joins him in the kitchen, helpfully taking mugs out of a cupboard. “Why did you-“  
“You should be brilliant more often.”  
“That’s not- I mean, that’s psychiatry.”  
“ _Exactly_.”

They stand hip to hip as the kettle boils. John turns his head to look at Sherlock.

“I don’t-“  
“I kissed you because I’m attracted to you.”  
“Okay...”  
“I don’t think Mycroft will have your sister killed first.”  
John rubs his chin, as if checking whether or not he ought to have a shave.  
“John?”  
“I need to think- Wait, Sherlock!“  
Sherlock strides rapidly across the room, away from John.  
“What-“  
“If you have to think about it, the feeling obviously isn’t mutual.” Sherlock picks up his suitcase and makes for his bedroom.

Sighing, John decides to make those drinks first before he attempts to address the situation or rather address his findings to Sherlock personally. He is of course attracted to Sherlock, to that great mind more so than the body, though it’s not that he’s not attracted to men or that Sherlock isn’t his usual type. Sherlock is in fact very much John’s type when it comes to male company: tall, pale and a little too thin. John, after all, has a fascination with skin so pale that it’s almost translucent, to the point where it probably reveals a mental aberration on his part that could just as easily have translated into a fascination with corpses. There’s something so very fragile about thin, colourless human skin, something that makes him think, occasionally, of scalpels and, occasionally, that he simply watched one too many Hammer Horror films as a child. In that sense, Sherlock physically fits the bill, but the physical has never been quite enough to draw John in. It’s Sherlock’s mind, the rapidity of his thoughts, the withering scorn of his sarcasm that keeps John enthralled. Sherlock is as brilliant as his body is breakable, which suits John’s tastes entirely.

The door to Sherlock’s bedroom is, predictably, closed and John just about manages to knock on it awkwardly with his elbow.  
“Go away.” Comes the muffled voice from inside, before a flurry of noises and the door suddenly opening.  
John hands over the mug and positions himself squarely on the threshold.  
Sherlock sniffs at his Horlicks, attempts to take a sip before deciding that it’s too hot and then addresses the mug calmly. “You needed time to think.”  
“Yes, but not about-“  
“You _are_ attracted to me.” Sherlock looks up, pleased.  
“Yes, but-“  
“I won’t let Mycroft murder your sister.”  
“No. No, that’s not-“  
“I won’t let him murder you either.”  
“Well, good, but-“  
“He’ll probably leave your sister-in-law alone.” Sherlock continues, conversationally.  
“Does-“ John stops, shakes his head.  
“Well, no.”  
“No?”  
“My brother doesn’t _murder_ anyone: people just happen to vanish.”

John knows better than to question whether or not that sort of thing really happens in a civilised, democratic, first world country. It shouldn’t, but then neither should plaintiffs wait upon Her Majesty’s leisure, under the watchful eyes of an attending physician. As if on cue, John’s mobile starts to ring, the tone specific and indicative.

“Go answer it.” Sherlock whispers, the ghost of a smile flickering across his face.  
“Thanks. I...”  
Sherlock leans in, lips brushing John’s cheek, before he pulls away and, still wearing that same enigmatic expression, withdraws into his room, closing the door softly behind him.

Half an hour later the car pulls up outside and John, now dressed smartly, quickly gets in. The door is closed and the car is pulling away from the curb before he really comprehends that Mycroft is sitting opposite him.

“If this is-“ He begins, heatedly.  
“Misappropriation of government funds? Really, John, is that the best you can manage?”  
John doesn’t dignify the comment with an answer and instead reaches into his jacket pocket for his phone.  
“Don’t.”  
“Or what?”  
Mycroft looks pained. “I really will get into trouble for misuse of classified information.”  
John relaxes slightly, letting his hands rest in his lap again. “What sort of trouble? Six of the best with the switch from your handler? A slap on the wrist and being told not to do it again?”  
“No, not either of those options, and marginally less that you’d deserve for the same.” Mycroft answers coolly.  
John looks away, staring at the streetlamps that pass them by. “I’d get a bullet in my brain and Sherlock would probably get a very large cheque from some smartly dressed men who _had every sympathy for his loss_.” John can feel his lip curling in a particularly vicious sneer.  
“If this conversation goes any further, my brother will be a very rich man.” Mycroft inspects his nails.  
That catches John’s attention. “They wouldn’t-“  
“ _Gibraltar_.”  
“That’s hardly...” A thought occurs to John, though he doesn’t dare voice it.  
“Lots of accidents out there of course.” Mycroft finishes for him.  
“And Sherlock?”  
“Would be very rich and very pretty, and look utterly charming in black.”  
“Oh.”  
“I imagine he might even wear a wedding ring.”  
John shakes his head, wonderingly.  
“He’d never get over the loss of course, though I’m sure that detective inspector of his would do his best to ease the burden.”  
“Are you... jealous of everyone he meets?” Which suddenly makes more sense to John.

Both their mobiles ring before Mycroft can reply, and if neither of them were quite so apprehensive as to the caller, John might even have been able to laugh at their suddenly mirrored actions.

“Well... no.” Mycroft says, soundly slightly wheedling in his tone.  
“No, sir. Of course not.” John sits up straighter as he answers.  
“I didn’t-“  
“No, definitely not, sir.”

Worry flashes across John’s face as Mycroft’s expression becomes more plaintive by the minute.

“I-“ Mycroft is cut off again.  
John swallows, reaches across the distance between them and, briefly, pats Mycroft’s hand reassuringly. “To tell you the truth, sir-“  
Mycroft moves his phone a little way from his ear and watches John closely.  
“Understood. It won’t happen again. Thank you, sir. Yes. Yes, he is. Good night.” John hangs up.  
“Oh.” Mycroft breathes out softly. “Yes. Of course. Goodbye.” And ends his own call.

John puts his phone away and looks down, at an indistinct point on the floor, for a moment. Then he moves to sit next to Mycroft. His fingers rest lightly against Mycroft’s jaw, then apply the tiniest bit of pressure, enough to make the other man turn wide eyes towards him.

“John?” Mycroft actually sounds uncertain.  
“Hush.”

This isn’t the Holmes brother he’d expected to be kissing so ardently, certainly. All practical considerations aside, it was the taste of Horlicks and not coffee that he’d been anticipating, mingled with the hot wetness of a yielding mouth. It’s pure instinct that leads him to slide a hand along Mycroft’s thigh and start to push the other backwards. Hands frantically clutching at his suit and a sharp hitch of breath remind John of what he’s doing and to whom.

John sits back, brushing his clothing down. “They’ll read that on you when you get back.” He says without looking Mycroft in the eye.  
“And Sherlock will read _you_.”

Later, once the job is done, John is surprised to find Mycroft in the waiting car again. He’d supposed that Mycroft would take himself off to either flaunt the obvious evidence at his superiors or just go home and let them presume that his intentions had been entirely amorous, and of no consequence to the sanctity of the state at all.

Mycroft doesn’t look at him but he does address himself, quite possibly, to John’s reflection in the window: “It would be better if I were to explain the circumstances to Sherlock in person.”  
“Alright.”  
“You of course understand that the situation between he and I is delicate.”  
“Of course.”

The conversation ends there and John wonders what Mycroft’s reaction will be should Sherlock choose the occasion to declare his attraction to John as well. In theory, Mycroft can’t simply have John ‘removed’, not now that John is part of that select group of servicemen and women whose only moral directive is the preservation of the state. Officially, John no longer has an opinion on the matter because all that matters are orders. Unofficially, he’s simply found a state sanctioned outlet for his more uncivilized urges. Public morality decries his actions while the state praises him. He recognises the dichotomy readily enough because it’s as commonplace as it is officially abhorrent.

Watching Mycroft staring out of the windows, John understands that the same hypocrisy applies there too. Incest is a taboo for many reasons but neither Mycroft nor Sherlock are hurting anyone with their actions. There are no legitimate issue to be considered, no troubles over inheritance or, truly, public standing. Sherlock is unconventional in the extreme and whoever he chooses to take up with really is nobody else’s business. Mycroft is one of the most powerful men in England and whoever he chooses to engage in romantic liaisons with will doubtlessly be automatically protected from all scandal as a matter of course. The latter puzzles John now that he thinks about it: Mycroft’s superiors must know that he’s taken up with his own brother by now. Mycroft has been taking Sherlock on international trips with him and, in his own way, advertising his ownership of the matter. If that’s the case it doesn’t make the slightest bit of sense that they’d fallen for John’s improvised excuse that he’d persuaded Mycroft to meet him tonight.

It occurs to him that those phone calls were a warning, a prompt for Mycroft to be careful when it came to acting on his jealousy rather than anything else. His superiors obviously know that he’s taken up with his own brother and couldn’t care less. What they are concerned about is his discretion. That he takes Sherlock along with him on international trips these days doesn’t bother them in the slightest but they want to make it clear that using government resources to do away with his romantic rivals isn’t entirely acceptable. John relaxes. At least that makes sense, in part at any rate.

“But if they’re trying to warn me off...” Mycroft mutters against his knuckles, as he leans on the armrest.  
“They ought to have warned me off as well.”  
“Precisely. What’s the point of telling me not to strangle you in the car when-“  
“ _Strangle_ me?” That’s a surprise.  
Mycroft reaches into his jacket and pulls out a coil of wire. “Quiet, efficient and easy to hide.”  
“You were going to... Oh my God.”  
“Now, John, calm down.”  
“Calm- you’re asking me to calm down when you... you...”  
“If it makes things any better: I wasn’t.”  
“So you just carry piano wire around in your pockets?” John’s still learning as far away from Mycroft as he can.  
“No, not usually. You must be aware of how useful this method is. For a man of my... stature, I couldn’t rely on being able to overpower an assailant, so the obvious choice is a method where their strength could be used against them.”  
“Like a rabbit in a snare.” It chills John, doubly so because the mental image that flashes across his mind is a rather horrific scene from the animated _Watership Down_.  
“Exactly so.”

They lapse into silence again, Mycroft evidently puzzling out the problem and John trying desperately to scrub the echoes of nightmarish British animation from his brain. Unfortunately, by way of association, he recalls that _The Plague Dogs_ was equally disturbing and finds that he’s squeezing his eyes shut in an ineffective attempt to blot out the memory.

“John?” Mycroft’s hand covers his.  
“Sorry, I...” Not that he can find a suitable way to explain it, though perhaps something carries in his gaze.  
Mycroft smiles, surprisingly gently. “I spent my childhood watching the _Puppet Master_ films. Sherlock was terrified of them.”  
John finds himself smiling in return. “I liked those. Better than the _Child’s Play_ ones really.”  
“Absolutely. Mrs Leech had so much more finesse than Chucky.”

Their hands are still joined by the time they arrive back at Baker Street and Mycroft brushes the pad of his thumb over John’s knuckles before letting go, leaving John to wonder what that means. Certainly, Mycroft seems far more amiable now that he’s ever been before. Not that that’s any reassurance, especially not from a man who carries a coil of piano wire in an expensive suit pocket. Of course he’d need some kind of grip to attach to the wire, for it to be really effective, but John has no doubt that Mycroft possesses that too. Mycroft insists that John lead the way up the stairs and despite the reassurance of Mycroft’s hand in the small of his back, John still wonders if he ought to be keeping one hand raised to his windpipe just in case.

It’s early enough that the light filtering through the curtains is enough to see by when they enter the living room. Sherlock lies supine on the couch, eyes closed. John attempts to leave, expecting that the brothers will have a fair amount to talk about but Mycroft stops him, the hand that rested against his back, sliding round to hold him in place.

“No.” Mycroft says it softly, mouth close to John’s ear.

It’s enough to spark realisation. John has no idea of Mycroft’s professional reputation but it’s probably well enough known by his superiors. Superiors who don’t at all find it questionable that he’s taken up with his own brother, or that his next conquest is his brother’s flatmate.

“I suppose this would be your exercising jus primae noctis.” John replies, turning slowly to face Mycroft.  
“Something like that.” Mycroft sounds amused at the reference.

Placing his hands against Mycroft’s chest seems the natural thing to do, enough to brace himself for what will come next. Mycroft’s arm tightens around John’s waist and his other hand comes up to cup John’s jaw, tilting his face towards Mycroft’s. As their lips meet, Mycroft’s hand slides down so that it wraps around John’s throat, holding him firmly in place and it doesn’t occur to John to pull away. When they do part and he attempts to step backwards, it’s to find that there’s no space, because Sherlock now stands behind him, pressed to his back.

“Really, brother mine, I _was_ going to share.”  
“If we’re invoking jus primae noctis, you’d better had.”  
“Which will make Marylebone the only place where it’s ever been officially practiced.”

Which is too much. John tries to stop himself but he can’t stifle the laugh that escapes his lips, and then Sherlock is laughing too while Mycroft watches them indulgently. As their laughter fades, John leans back against Sherlock, tilting his head back to look up at him. He catches hold of the lapel of Sherlock’s dressing –gown with a hand, and tugs him down. Sherlock doesn’t require further prompting: claiming John’s mouth just as has brother has done only moments before.

**Author's Note:**

>  _Watership Down_ was a British animation adaption of the novel, released in 1978. _The Plague Dogs_ was a 1982 animation adaption of another Richard Adams novel. Both contained fairly disturbing scenes.  
>  The _Puppet Master_ films were a series of ten films produced by Full Moon Studios, beginning in 1989. The _Child’s Play_ series consisted of five films that began in 1988.  
>  Jus primae noctis translates as the ‘right of the first night’ and refers to the notion of droit de seigneur, a popularly rumoured Medieval practice of which there is yet to be any proof.


End file.
